The Minecraft community has been left to wonder what's next after Notch announced on Friday that he'll be stepping down from his role as lead developer of the multi-million dollar game.

Ever since Minecraft came out of beta, the fan response seems to have turned critical of the game's current course of development. I'm speaking for myself here, but the impression I've gotten from a few Minecraft forums and reddit seems to indicate that fans are disappointed with the release version. While many believe that Minecraft was an amazing proof of concept while in beta, the implementation of features in the release version is sorely lacking.

Just a couple of popular concerns include the game's unfinished single player elements, like unresponsive NPC towns, and its incredibly basic graphical style. A comprehensive list can be found here, for those interested.

Amidst all these concerns, I'm still hopeful for the future of Minecraft. But here's what I absolutely want to see in the next patches:

1) Release of full, unobfuscated source code
Notch has already stated that this is one of their ultimate goals for Minecraft. Modders have played an immense role in the development of the game, and tons of mods have been repurposed into actual features in Minecraft's releases. Making the job easier for modders is

2) More clear direction for single player
What's the role of NPCs in Minecraft? Can single player actually have a story? Should there be some sort of end game? (There is one now, but it doesn't make sense in relation to the rest of Minecraft.)

3) Larger communities
Generally speaking, Minecraft servers have a low amount of players. I just did a search on google and couldn't find a server with a capacity greater than 300 players. Sure hacked servers can support more, but they're quite rare. Keep in mind that few of these servers will be completely full. The official reddit Minecraft server has a capacity of 200 people, but only about 100 are on at any given time.

If there's one thing the Minecraft community can agree on, it's that the game has massive potential. Now's the chance for Minecraft's developers to sit down and figure out what their game is really about. As long as they listen to the community and continue to release frequent updates, I'm confident Minecraft will be enjoyed for many years._________________continuous improvement